Prison officers helped missing Epping hotel sex offender find his way to the station

Hadush Kebatu, who was due to be deported, was heard asking staff: 'Where do I go, what do I do?' before taking train to London

- John Simpson Home Affairs Editor

A fugitive child sex offender spent 90 minutes asking prison staff who had mistakenly released him from HMP Chelmsford where he should go before they sent him to a train station, a witness said.

A manhunt continued last night for Hadush Kebatu, 41, who was staying at the Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex, when he committed a string of sex offences including attempting to kiss a 14-year-old girl, prompting protests that erupted into disorder this summer.

Kebatu was sentenced to a year in prison last month and had been due to be deported but was instead released with his belongings and given a payment of £76, the standard discharge grant for initial living expenses.

The Ministry of Justice blamed "human error" and said a prison officer had been suspended pending a full investigation, while probation officers warned that the government's early release scheme had put "massive pressure in terms of the traffic going in and out of the prison gates".

A delivery driver who was present when Kebatu was released told Sky News that he had reentered the prison four or five times before staff directed him to the train station.